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Microsoft antitrust finally over?

U.S. District Court Judge Colleen Kollar-Kotelly has essentially approved the terms of the Microsoft Antitrust Settlement, hopefully brining an end to the long, drawn-out and some would say effectively useless battle between Microsoft and the government. The judge has made a few changes to the terms that were brought before her, and both parties now have a week to consider the changes and refile should they disagree with them. The changes, while not totally insignificant, should cause little stress to each party. The judge has stipulated, rather fairly, that the settlement compliance oversight committee include non-MS personnel, and that the company disclose the details of its networking protocols (e.g., SMB) six months ahead of schedule.

In other words, the proposal to break Microsoft up into a handful of companies is now completely dead, much to the dismay of the dissenting states that are not siding with the feds. But has Microsoft pulled off an amazing victory here? The answer to that question depends more on your politics and market ideals than anything else. The restrictions imposed by the settlement are not candy coated fruit loops, to be sure. Microsoft will have to alter its behavior in many ways to stay compliant with this decision. For me, the most significant aspect of the settlement is this:

Microsoft shall not retaliate against or threaten retaliation against an OEM by altering Microsoft?s commercial relations with that OEM, or by withholding newly introduced forms of non-monetary Consideration (including but not limited to new versions of existing forms of non-monetary Consideration) from that OEM, because it is known to Microsoft that the OEM is or is contemplating:

1. developing, distributing, promoting, using, selling, or licensing any software that competes with Microsoft Platform Software or any product or service that distributes or promotes any Non-Microsoft Middleware;2. shipping a Personal Computer that (a) includes both a Windows Operating System Product and a non-Microsoft Operating System, or (b) will boot with more than one Operating System; or3. exercising any of the options or alternatives provided for under this Final Judgment.

Additionally, Microsoft will have to publish uniform pricing for OEMs, and may not exercise control over how OEMs configure the desktop with respect to third party apps and tools. Additionally, Microsoft will have to publish via MSDN the details of any API that is used as "Middleware," that is, "the interfaces, including any associated callback interfaces, that Microsoft Middleware running on a Windows Operating System Product uses to call upon that Windows Operating System Product in order to obtain any services from that Windows Operating System Product." However, it is worth noting this major concession which I fear could be exploited at great length:

No provision of this Final Judgment shall: 1. Require Microsoft to document, disclose or license to third parties: (a) portions of APIs or Documentation or portions or layers of Communications Protocols the disclosure of which would compromise the security of a particular installation or group of installations of anti-piracy, anti-virus, software licensing, digital rights management, encryption or authentication systems, including without limitation, keys, authorization tokens or enforcement criteria; or (b) any API, interface or other information related to any Microsoft product if lawfully directed not to do so by a governmental agency of competent jurisdiction.

The Settlement has gone too far for some folks, and not far enough for others. But, that's why it's called a Settlement. What will be interesting is what effect, if any, this settlement has on the brewing problems in the European Union. As the EU looks to add at least 10 additional member states, the EU market will be potentially larger than the North American market.

Ken Fisher / Ken is the founder & Editor-in-Chief of Ars Technica. A veteran of the IT industry and a scholar of antiquity, Ken studies the emergence of intellectual property regimes and their effects on culture and innovation.